CC: Flags

Some Flags for The Sims 3

I don't generally do a lot with custom content, but there were a couple of flags that I wanted to see flying in Sunset Valley, so I recoloured a few. Here is a .zip file containing a small collection of flags:

Sim Nationalist banner

LGBTQ Pride (Rainbow flag)

Canada

Russia

USA

POW / MIA "You are not forgotten"

To use them in your game: unzip and copy any one of the .package files into a directory named Mods/Packages under your "The Sims 3" directory. The flag that you put there will replace the default flag that flies from all the flagpoles in town. To undo the modification, just remove the .package files from that directory (and restart the game; the game only checks for files there when it is starting up.)

Notes:

I am sorry but no, I do not know a way to allow different flags to fly from different poles -- that is a much more extensive modification to the game. I wish there were a way, because I would love to see the Maple Leaf and the Sim National flags on side-by-side poles.

I have checked the colours for correctness by reference to some Government web sites and Pantone-to-RGB conversion guides. To my eye, these flags look too bright and saturated in the game compared to the objects around them. Perhaps in the future I will work on that. If you've ever seen a real Canadian flag hoisted up in the sun, you know that it really can be strikingly scarlet, so perhaps these colours really are OK.

I have only changed the colours, not the proportions of the game's default flag, so all of these flags are 2:1 (twice as long on the fly as they are on the pole.) A lot of real national flags are more square than that; for example, the Russian flag is officially 3:2. The 2:1 proportion is exactly right for the Canadian and Sim National flags, and quite close for the USA flag. (It was also correct for the Russian flag for a few years in the 1990's.) I added width to the Russian and POW/MIA flags to make them fit into the same physical space as the EA default flag. There might be some trick I can try with transparency to shorten them to their own proper sizes, but I haven't tried it yet.